There are a few potentially important details surrounding the timeline leading to Bowe Bergdahls release that might deserve some discussion. Truth Revolt supplies some details on the timeline: This weeks [the week of Bergdahls release] secret diplomacy was not the first time the U.S. government had engaged the Taliban in an effort to negotiate a prisoner swap for the release of Bergdahl. In 2011, State Department officials held a series of meetings with Taliban leaders in Doha. In Congress, there was bipartisan opposition to any release of Guantanamo prisoners. After the negotiations were made public in early 2012 by Sen....

In a surprise move, Saudi Arabia sacked its long-time oil minister over the weekend, an event that illustrates the near-total control that the new young Saudi prince has obtained over the countrys energy industry. For many years, Ali al-Naimi, the outgoing Saudi oil minister, was the voice of Saudi Arabias oil industry and policy. Even seemingly insignificant remarks from al-Naimi could move oil prices up or down. But the 80-year old oil minister has seen his power eclipsed by the 30-year old Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. In April, when al-Naimi was forced to backtrack on the Doha oil...

WE DONT care about oil prices, Muhammad bin Salman, Saudi Arabias deputy crown prince, recently told Bloomberg, a news agency: $30 or $70, they are all the same to us. Such comments by the man calling the shots in the worlds biggest oil power should be taken with a pinch of salt. Low oil prices cost the country billions, threaten its credit rating and are turning it from creditor to debtor: this week it set out to raise $10 billion from global banks. Yet the claim is not entirely hollow, either. Saudi Arabia is determined not to give any succour...

Saudi Arabia single-handedly scuttled the Doha meeting, knowing all along that Iran would not participate, with a valid reason. The Russians and others agreed to proceed without Iran, planning to include them at a later date. So if everything was known beforehand, why did the Saudis pour cold water on the aspirations of the remaining members, risking its alienation from Russia and the OPEC community? Was it simply Saudi enmity toward Iran? Not exactly. Upon closer scrutiny, we can find the Saudi masterstroke behind Doha. It is well known that Saudi Arabia is heavily dependent on oil revenues, and that...

WASHINGTON  The U.S. government is poised to approve two long-delayed sales of Boeing Co. fighter jets to Qatar and Kuwait, and could announce the multibillion-dollar deals during President Barack Obama's visit to the Gulf this week, according to two sources familiar with the matter. The decision would mean more job security for thousands of workers at Boeing's sprawling plant in north St. Louis County, where the F-15 fighter and F/A-18E/F Super Hornets are made. Both deals have been stalled amid concerns raised by Israel that equipment sent to Gulf states could fall into the wrong hands and be used...

No incentive for Saudis to let up Getty Saudi Arabia's minister of Oil and Mineral Resources Ali al-Naimi (C) arrives for the OPEC meeting, in the Qatari capital Doha, By WilliamWatts Deputy markets editor Why would the Saudis give up now?Thats the question crude oil bulls should have been asking themselves ahead of the Sunday meeting of major oil producers that failed to produce an agreement to put a lid on production. Prospects for a deal fell apart after Iran refused to sign up, prompting Saudi Arabia, the worlds swing producer, to effectively walk away. Those that believed Riyadh had...

While everyone is talking about the failure of the Doha negotiations, Kuwait has more than made up for OPECs failure all on its own. Kuwaits oil workers walked off the job this weekend, flexing their muscles over a pay dispute. The state-owned Kuwait Oil Company took to Twitter to report the damage done by the workers strike, announcing that oil production fell to 1.1 million barrels per day on Sunday, a catastrophic development considering it normally produces nearly 3 mb/d. Also, Kuwait Petroleum Corp., the state-owned refining company, said that its production of refined products dropped from 930,000 to 520,000...

Oil prices tumbled on Monday after a meeting by major exporters in Qatar collapsed without an agreement to freeze output, leaving the credibility of the OPEC producer cartel in tatters and the world awash with unwanted fuel. Tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran were blamed for the failure, which revived industry fears that major government-controlled producers will increase their battle for market share by offering ever-steeper discounts. "OPEC's credibility to coordinate output is now very low," said Peter Lee of BMI Research, a unit of rating agency Fitch. "This isn't just about oil for the Saudis. It's as much about...

Saudi Arabia turns oil weapon on Iran: Kemp By Reuters Published: 13:22 GMT, 18 April 2016 | Updated: 13:22 GMT, 18 April 2016 By John Kemp LONDON, April 18 (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia's decision to scupper negotiations on a coordinated oil output freeze in Doha on Sunday seems to confirm a significant shift in the kingdom's oil policy. For decades, the kingdom has insisted it does not wield oil as a diplomatic weapon, but at the weekend it did just that as part of an intensifying conflict with Iran. ("Saudi-Iran tensions scupper deal to freeze oil output", Reuters, April 17)...

Qatar Airways has announced plans to launch the worldâs longest direct flight: a 9,034-mile schlep from Doha to Auckland. Should the route get the green light, it would beat the current record holder â Qantasâs Dallas-Sydney service â by almost 500 miles. The journey time would be an estimated 18 hours and 34 minutes, according to the journey planning website travelmath.com.

Attorneys representing the family of Ahmed âclock kidâ Mohamed sent a letter to Irving, Texas, officials demanding $10 million in compensation for âdamagesâ and written apologies from the cityâs mayor and police chief. snip After making appearances at a number of high-profile locations, including the White House, Mohamed and his family moved to Qatar. âFor personal security reasons, Ahmed and family are in Doha, Qatar. However, when they feel safe again, all of them want more than anything to come home, to Irving, Texas,â the letter states.

As I walked into the department this bright brisk morning, coffee cheerily in hand, the live global seismogram display in the atrium caught my eye with an alarming event that had just happened during my bike ride into work. *gasp* that looks bad *gasp* that looks bad BIG earthquake, somewhere in the vicinity of Central/Southern Asia. Indeed, an earthquake deep (>200 km) beneath the Hindu Kush mountains of Afghanistan had shaken a huge swath of Central and South Asia. The great depth of the earthquake meant less extreme shaking at the epicenter (nobody lives closer than 212 km from the...

To the American Public: Over the course of the last month, the Qatar Awareness Campaign has issued 25 letters, addressed to people, companies, organizations, and universities who profit from their relationship with the state sponsor of terror, Qatar. Why? Despite their official denials, Qatar is the nation that funds Hamas, Fatah, Boko Haram, al Qaeda and the Islamic State. Qatar, as the host country of the revolutionary Muslim Brotherhood and one of the wealthiest countries in the world, attracts these fanatical, murderous groups like a magnet, showering them with endless funding and resources. Looking back, it is an astonishing list...

Carnegie Mellon University Office of the President, Dr. Subra Suresh 5000 Forbes Avenue Pittsburgh, PA 15213 412-268-2000 Dear Dr. Suresh: This letter is being sent to you on behalf of the Qatar Awareness Campaign Coalition. The purpose is to inform you and the public of the activities of Qatar, the country whose capital hosts a campus of Carnegie Mellon University. Since 2001, the Qatar Foundation has borne all campus development costs associated with the campus in Dohas Education City. (Also see here.) Since 2004, Carnegie Mellon has operated Carnegie Mellon in Qatar, as part of Qatars Education City. The educational...

Palestinian and other Arab commentators are blasting Egypt's cease-fire offer this week in the Israeli-Gazan fighting, saying it was a gift to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who accepted it, and a trap for Hamas, which rejected it. Azmi Bishara, the fugitive former Knesset member who now heads the Arab Center for Research and Policy in Doha, Qatar, wrote in the pan-Arab alaraby.co.uk that the offer gave no relief to Gaza, nor freedom for the Hamas members recently returned to Israeli prisons. "This Egyptian declaration represents a stab in the back to the resistance and the people of Gaza. [T]his...

"In his new book, Dark Forces: The Truth About What Happened in Ben­ghazi (Broadside Books), writer Kenneth R. Timmerman explains how the US governments efforts to arm the Libyan rebels backfired, flooding weapons into Syria, and as he ­reveals here, Afghanistan: The Obama administration isnt only giving the Taliban back its commanders  its giving them weapons. Miliary records and sources reveal that on July 25, 2012, Taliban fighters in Kunar province successfully targeted a US Army CH-47 helicopter with a new generation Stinger missile...."

<p>MILAN (AP)  Foreign ministry officials in Rome and Vienna confirm that names of two nationals listed on the manifest of the missing Malaysian airlines flight match passports reported stolen in Thailand.</p>
<p>Italy's Foreign Ministry said Saturday that an Italian man whose name was listed as being aboard is traveling in Thailand and was not aboard the plane.</p>

South Sudan News: Turabi Urges Jihadists to ÂReuniteÂ with South SudanJuba Â June 13 Â (SSN) Hassan al-Turabi Â the spiritual guide of SudanÂs Islamists-Jihadists and the doyen of the global Jihadist trend since the early 1990â˛s Â is in Doha, Qatar, to consult with Sheikh Youssuf al-Qaradawi Â the spiritual guide of the Muslim Brothers and the entire Sunni Islamist trend. The main subject of the consultations between Turabi and Qaradawi is how to return Sudan to its former role and glory as a leader of global Islamism-Jihadism. Both veteran luminaries of radical Sunni Islam are convinced that the...

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Tuesday Washington was increasingly confident that weapons being sent to the Syrian opposition by other countries were going to moderate forces. Kerry, on his first overseas tour since taking office, told a news conference in Doha he had held talks with nations in the region about the kinds of arms being sent to the different Syrian opposition forces. Saudi Arabia and Qatar are widely believed to be providing weapons to the rebels, but the United States says it does not wish to send arms for fear they may find their way to...

A couple of weeks ago the great global warming bandwagon coughed and spluttered to a halt in Doha, the latest stop on its never-ending world tour. The annual UN climate conference COP18 is no small affair. This is a bandwagon whose riders number in the thousands: motorcades of politicians, buses full of technocrats and policy wonks and jumbo-jets full of hippies travelling half way round the world, (ostensibly) to save the planet from the (allegedly) pressing problem of climate change This is despite the fact that nobody seems able to point to any great problems caused by the modest warming...

Attention: News Editors, Political, Science and Environment Reporters After 16 years without warming, future climate talks must focus on preparation for, and adaption to, climate change, not vainly trying to stop it. Ottawa, Canada, December 9, 2012: Governments must re-examine climate change science before considering further, more concrete commitments in the United Nations negotiating process, said Tom Harris, executive director of the International Climate Science Coalition (ICSC), which is headquartered in Ottawa, Canada. In their November 29th open letter to the U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, scientists from across the globe explained that the science relied upon by the U.N....

In one of the most poignant moments of the Doha climate talks, the Philippine climate change commissioner, Naderev M. Sano, appealed to his fellow negotiators at a session deciding the contours of the second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol. Please let Doha be remembered as the place where we found the political will to turn things around, he said as he choked back tears. Just days before, Typhoon Bopha had hit the Philippines, killing hundreds of people. The typhoon, having been both unusually forceful and out of season, was deemed  like Hurricane Sandy  to be an extreme...

Delegates at UN climate talks in Qatar have agreed to extend the Kyoto Protocol until 2020, avoiding a major new setback. The deal, agreed by nearly 200 nations, keeps the protocol alive as the only legally binding plan for combating global warming. However, it only covers developed nations whose share of world greenhouse gas emissions is less than 15%. The US - a major polluter - has never ratified the original 1997 protocol. The agreement had been due to expire later this year.

UNICEF, UNESCO, and other UN agencies and NGOs have teamed up to flood classrooms with an ongoing tsunami of global-warming indoctrination. UN Summit: Transforming Your Kids into "Climate Change Agents" The New American 06 December 2012 Do your children (or grandchildren) have nightmares about the Earth melting or exploding due to human-caused global warming? Do they believe they have no future because our planet is dying, the icecaps and glaciers are melting, the sea levels are rising, islands and coastal areas are disappearing, polar bears and children are drowning, plant and animal species are rapidly going extinct, and extreme...

Talk about alignment of the stars! Barack Obama based his 2008 presidential campaign on the principle of sharing the wealth. He won, got reelected and now has, at least in his own mind, a flat-out mandate to extend his vision for wealth redistribution (and wealth destruction) planet-wide. This week, as United Nations luminaries gather in Doha, Qatar, for the 18th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres, the self-described daughter of a revolutionary, has presented her goals. The most important is a massive transfer of wealth  $100 billion a...

DOHA, Qatar  Ms. Christiana Figueres, chief secretary of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, has told a press conference here that the 18th Conference of the States Parties will bring about a complete economic transformation of the world. She does not have in mind a democratic, free-market transformation. The intention of these 18 successive annual vacations for the worlds pampered dictators in exotic, sun-drenched locations is what it always was: to create a treaty binding more than 190 nations to do as the Secretariat says. Democracy? Whats that? Todd Stern, the U.S. lead negotiator, was similarly upbeat at...

The Algerian terrorist who plotted to blow up Los Angeles International Airport at the height of New Year celebrations five years ago was sentenced to 22 years in prison on Wednesday. Defence lawyers had asked for 12˝ years for Ahmed Ressam, 38, while prosecutors wanted 35 years. Mr Ressam, who had briefly co-operated with authorities in tracking down other terrorists, said nothing in court, but Thomas Hillier, a federal public defender, said his client had given John Coughenour, a US district judge, a note prior to the sentencing. The note, according to Mr Hillier, said: I am sorry for what...

Interesting.... This muslim Cleric visited london EXACTLY one year ago from the date of the attacks, July 7, 2004 CNSNews.com) - London Mayor Ken Livingstone's previous support of a Muslim cleric who advocates suicide bombings may cause him some embarrassment as he now must speak for the city in the wake of Thursday's terrorist bombings. Livingstone condemned the Thursday attacks as "mass murder," and added that "this was not a terrorist attack against the mighty or the powerful, it is not aimed at presidents or prime ministers, it was aimed at ordinary working-class Londoners." Yet Livingstone has in the past...

Note: Video included. "Bin Laden's Son Is Hospitalized After He Hears His Father's Voice Omar Bin Laden Is Treated for Schizophrenia, Wife Asks for Divorce" July 9, 2010 SNIPPET: ""It's true that he was put on medication but released himself early," said a spokesman for Zeina Al Sabah, Omar's wife. The spokesman confirmed that Omar had bipolar disorder and was on anti-depressants." SNIPPET: ""Omar loves and hates Osama at the same time," she said." SNIPPET: "Omar, 29, has denounced his father's terrorist tactics and ideology. But he still maintains an emotional bond..." SNIPPET: "Much of Osama Bin Laden's family, comprising...

NOTE: THIS IS THE NEW FLOTILLA/CONVOY/"HUMANITARIAN AID"/"HUMAN RIGHTS ACTIVISTS" THREAD. SNIPPET: "While the debate over mosque development in New York continues to dominate the news cycle, opposing sides in the Israeli blockade on Gaza are gearing up for a new round of confrontations that could take place as soon as next month. Although the list of items restricted from entering Gaza has been dramatically reduced, George Galloway, the ex-British MP who runs the group Viva Palestina, promises a new land convoy leaving from London, Casablanca and Doha September 18. Galloway has made it clear his mission has more to do...

A warship and a destroyer belonging to the Iranian naval fleet have berthed at Qatar's Doha port upon an invitation by Qatari Naval officials. Iranian Ambassador to Doha Abdullah Sohrabi and Iran's military attache in Qatar Brigadier-General Mashallah Poursheh conferred with commanders and cadets aboard the Bandar Abbas warship and Naqdi Destroyer. Sohrabi said that the symbolic docking of the Iranian warship and destroyer at the Qatari capital is a step toward the improvement of bilateral defense ties between the two countries. Since Iran and Qatar are neighbors and have common sea borders, issues such as defense cooperation and security...

NEW DELHI: SNIPPET: "The US national, identified as Winston Marshal Carmichael, was detained late last night after CISF personnel found knife in his hand baggage during the security check when he was to leave for Doha in a Qatar Airways flight, official sources said. ( Watch Video ) Reminiscent of the case of terror suspect David Headley, arrested in Chicago in October last for allegedly plotting terror strikes in India, Carmichael is a convert from Christianity to Islam. The New York resident changed his religion some 40 years ago. Carmichael, who was flying to Doha in a Qatar Airways flight,...

"Two held with fake papers" Manju V , TNN, 23 January 2010, 04:48am IST SNIPPET: "MUMBAI: Hours before Indian intelligence agencies put all flights operating from India on a high alert against possible hijack attempts, two Sri Lankan nationals  one flying to New York and the other to London  were arrested by immigration officials at the Kochi airport on Thursday for carrying forged Indian passports and travel documents." The two Sri Lankan nationals were being assisted by two employees of a private multinational ground-handling company. SNIPPET: "One of the employees fled the scene when the passengers were caught."...

Note: The following text is a quote: Remarks of Attorney General Eric Holder at the Opening Plenary of the VI Ministerial Global Forum on Fighting Corruption and Safeguarding Integrity Doha, Qatar ~ Saturday, November 7, 2009 Your Highness, Attorney General Al-Marri, Excellencies, Colleagues: It is a distinct honor for me to join you to inaugurate the Sixth Global Forum on Combating Corruption and Safeguarding Integrity. Let me begin by commending the leadership and hospitality of His Highness, the Emir -- as well as that of His Excellency Dr. Al-Marri and of the Government of Qatar -- in their role as...

Note: The following text is a quote: YOU ARE HERE: Home > Reports > Consular Affairs Bulletins > Report Warden Message: U.S. Embassy Doha, Qatar, Temporary Closure CONSULAR AFFAIRS BULLETINS Middle East / N. Africa - Qatar 18 May 2009 RELATED REPORTS 13 Jan 2009 WARDEN MESSAGE: DOHA, QATAR, PROTEST JANUARY 13 U.S. Embassy Doha issued the following Warden Message on May 18: At approximately 9:00 a.m, on May 18 a suspicious powder was discovered at the U.S. Embassy in Doha, Qatar. The suspicious substance is being sent to a laboratory for analysis. Until the results are received and a...

The U.S. Treasury Department fined the U.S. branch of Qatars largest private commercial bank $5 million Tuesday to settle charges that it failed to report transactions potentially tied to terrorism. Doha Bank failed to file regulatory suspicious activity reports (SARs) more than 500 times, and poorly audited its compliance program, according to the departments Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) and Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN). The bank also had an antiquated wire transfer system that prevented it from finding and aggregating suspicious transactions, according to a consent order.

As usual, Libyan leader raised eyebrows Monday with his incendiary but hilarious remarks at the Arab summit in Doha. As the Emir of host Qatar welcomed Saudi King Abdullah ibn Abdulaziz al Saud, Libyan President Moammar Kadafi interrupted him addressing the Saudi king, saying: "I seize the opportunity to tell my brother Abdullah, you have been evasive and scared of confrontation for six years. I want to assure you today not to be scared. I am telling you after six years it was proved that lies stand behind you and your grave awaits you. You were created by Britain and...

When Sudanese President Omar Al-Bashir arrived in Cairo yesterday noon for talks with President Hosni Mubarak it was his second overseas trip since the arrest warrant indicting him for war crimes and crimes against humanity was issued on 4 March by the International Criminal Court (ICC). The message Al-Bashir is sending by making consecutive trips to Asmara and Cairo is, his aides say, one of "defiance" against the ICC warrant. Official Sudanese statements suggest Al-Bashir's defiance may well extend to the annual Arab summit in Doha on 30 March despite orchestrated appeals by the masses and an unprecedented religious edict...

Osama bin Laden's son Omar and his British wife arrived in the Qatari capital Doha yesterday after being refused entry to Egypt, Al Jazeera television reported. The Qatar-based television said Omar bin Laden arrived in the Gulf Arab state on an Egyptian passenger aircraft. It gave no further details. Omar bin Laden and his wife arrived on Saturday in Egypt from Madrid after the Spanish authorities refused his request for asylum. The couple, who lived in Egypt for several months in 2007 and 2008, have also been denied entry to Britain.

The Not-So-Omnipotent China by: Daniel Smith, August 07, 2008 As the worlds attention and conspiracy theorists turn to Beijing this August, Western nations should not forget Chinas role in The Collapse of the [World Trade Organization (WTO)] Doha Round Trade Talks in Geneva on July 29. The facts of the failed negotiations reveal a more impotent China than Americans would expect. Frank Vargo, chief spokesman on trade issues for the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM), viewed the collapse of the seven-year Doha Rounds as a watershed. He was one of several distinguished panelists who addressed a crowd at the American...

THE latest round of global agricultural trade negotiations that began seven years ago in Doha, Qatar, collapsed in acrimony this week in Geneva. While India and China are getting the blame for refusing to reduce import tariffs and farm subsidies, you can assume that trade officials in Europe and the United States are breathing a sigh of relief that they arent going to have to limit their own protectionism... --snip-- First, they are transparent election-cycle harvests for farm-state politicians, who have small constituencies but exercise outsized national political clout. Second, because such special-interest legislation wins little broad public support, its...

The demise of the Doha trade round is another blow to the struggling world economy, and there's plenty of blame to go around. But the crucial question going forward is whether this is merely a temporary setback, or if it marks the end of the post-World War II free-trade era that has done so much to spread prosperity. We tend by nature and history toward optimism, but no one should sugar-coat Doha's collapse. For the first time since the multilateral trading rounds began after World War II, a trade expansion effort has ended in failure. In 1990, trade represented about...

Trade: The collapse of the Doha round of world trade talks is more than a bureaucratic event. It's a tragedy for the global economy, both for developing nations and those already wealthy.Fact is, the world economy could use a little help. Having suffered housing meltdowns, financial crises, and soaring energy and food costs, many nations will struggle to grow over the next few years. Many will find themselves poorer by decade's end. That's why the Doha Round of trade talks, named for the city in Qatar where discussions began in 2001, was so important. It would have opened key markets...

The Doha round of world trade talks has collapsed in what one former trade chief called the biggest blow to globalisation since the end of the Cold War. An emergency World Trade Organisation summit aimed at resuscitating the seven-year long talks broke down in acrimony last night. Negotiators warned that there was now little or no chance of salvaging the talks, which promised to bring down trade tariffs, pull millions out of poverty and keep food and goods prices under control. It is the first time a major set of world trade talks has collapsed entirely, and insiders warned that...

Al-Qaeda Draws New Recruits Via Internet Al-Qaeda is using the Internet to recruit vulnerable young people to its terrorist network, according to a programme aired on Saudi Arabian TV late on Tuesday. Umm Osama, the founder of al-Qaeda's first women-only website, al-Khansa, joined several others on the programme to discuss how they renounced jihadist ideology. Among those who sought a response to this question was an imam from the Medina mosque, Saleh Ibn Awad al-Mudamsi, and the father of a young al-Qaeda suspect held in an Iraqi prison. Read More Qaeda Targets U.S. Oil Interests in North Africa U.S....

The majority coalition would never elect him if they could pick whomever they want. Suleiman is well-known as a moderate pro-Syrian. He may be an improvement over Lebanons last president, Emile Lahoud, who was nothing if not a tool of Syrias tyrant Bashar Assad, but frankly no one could be worse than Lahoud outside the ranks of the blatantly fascist Syrian Social Nationalist Party. Hezbollah still gets to keep the unilaterally installed high-tech surveillance system in Lebanons only international airport, and of course its fighters will hold onto their illegal weapons. With freshly minted blocking minority powers, Secretary General Hassan...

DOHA (AFP) - Damage to several undersea telecom cables that caused outages across the Middle East and Asia could have been an act of sabotage, the International Telecommunication Union said on Monday. "We do not want to preempt the results of ongoing investigations, but we do not rule out that a deliberate act of sabotage caused the damage to the undersea cables over two weeks ago," the UN agency's head of development, Sami al-Murshed, told AFP.

SYDNEY, Australia - President Bush and Chinese President Hu Jintao, leaders of two of the world's worst polluting nations, called Thursday for greater international cooperation in tackling climate change without stifling economic growth. Bush also was to push for expanded trade with Pacific Rim nations and appeal for help in getting stalled global trade talks going again. He was laying out his views on the environment, energy security and the economic costs of terrorism in a speech to business leaders from the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum. Climate change was high on the agenda of the U.S. and Chinese presidents in...